Top Ten clues that we live in a country run by idiots

WASHINGTON, September 10, 2014 – We recently chanced upon some scurrilous words of wisdom from something called “Food For Thought,” an essay purportedly authored by one Junius P. Long. It lists the ways a casual observer can tell if he or she is living in a country run by idiots.

A moderately thorough web search doesn’t reveal one iota of useful information about just who this Junius P. Long actually is, though countless sites have been reprinting “Food For Thought” recently. (We’ll continue our own bibliographical sleuthing offline or in the library and invite commentators to weigh in with any clues in the meantime.)

Whoever Junius is, his amusing musings on the current U.S. State of Disunion, based on recent historical trends, are spot on. So we’re reproducing them here in an interesting month when the Fall TV season competes with coverage of 2014’s midterm elections. On the face of it, they seem to be one and the same.

Our version of Long’s observations is slightly re-ordered for effect from what purports to be the original. That list contained 11 signposts indicating an idiocracy, but one of them was actually overruled a couple of years back. We add it back in as an appendix after our remaining List of 10. Are we revisionists? If so, why not? Everyone else is.

Clues we live in a country run by idiots:

1. If you can get arrested for hunting or fishing without a license, but not for being in the country illegally, you live in a country run by idiots.

2. If you have to show identification to board an airplane, cash a check, buy liquor or check out a library book, but not to vote on who runs the government, you live in a country run by idiots.

3. If a seven year old boy can be thrown out of grade school for saying his teacher’s “cute,” but hosting a sexual exploration or diversity class in grade school is perfectly acceptable, you live in a country run by idiots.

4. If you have to get your parents’ permission to go on a field trip or take an aspirin in school, but not to get an abortion, you live in a country run by idiots.

5. If an 80-year-old woman can be stripped searched by the TSA but a woman in a hijab is only subject to having her neck and head searched, you live in a country run by idiots.

6. If your government believes that the best way to eradicate trillions of dollars of debt is to spend trillions more, you live in a country run by idiots.

7. If hard work and success are met with higher taxes and more government intrusion, while not working is rewarded with EBT cards, WIC checks, Medicaid, subsidized housing and free cell phones, you live in a country run by idiots.

8. If the government’s plan for getting people back to work is to incentivize NOT working, with 99 weeks of unemployment checks and no requirement to prove they applied but can’t find work, you live in a country run by idiots.

9. If the government wants to ban stable, law-abiding citizens from owning gun magazines with more than ten rounds, but gives 20 F-16 fighter jets to the crazy leaders in Egypt, you live in a country run by idiots.

10. If being stripped of the ability to defend yourself makes you more “safe” according to the government, you live in a country run by idiots.

Appendix:

Given that the powers of reason finally prevailed in the Big Apple when courts invalidated former Mayor Nanny Bloomberg’s idiotic anti-soft drink edict, we edited the entry that referenced that PC nonsense out of “Junius Long’s” list. But for the sake of history, here it is:

If, in the largest city, you can buy two 16-ounce sodas, but not a 24-ounce soda because 24-ounces of a sugary drink might make you fat, you live in a country run by idiots.

Biographical Note: Dateline Award-winning music and theater critic for The Connection Newspapers and the Reston-Fairfax Times, Terry was the music critic for the Washington Times print edition (1994-2010) and online Communities (2010-2014). Since 2014, he has been the Business and Entertainment Editor for Communities Digital News (CDN).

A former stockbroker and a writer and editor with many interests, he served as editor under contract from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and continues to write on science and business topics. He is a graduate of Georgetown University (BA, MA) and the University of South Carolina where he was awarded a Ph.D. in English and American Literature and co-founded one of the earliest Writing Labs in the country. Twitter: @terryp17